Thursday, May 3, 2012

Rationalizing a 1960 Vibrolux amp

This amp is the second in a trio of estate finds belonging to a friend of mine who owns a music shop. The first through the mill was a 1954 Deluxe about which more anon.

This amp is a May, 1960 5F11 Vibrolux that is in beautiful cosmetic shape but which has been hacked a bit. It's not ready for a clean bill of health yet but the patient did not die on the operating table. It has the original output transformer but the power transformer has been changed for something or other, and a 12" ceramic speaker has been installed in place of the original Jensen P10R.

This is but a preliminary report with pics to satisfy some catcalls from the audience.

After redoing the transformer wiring and removing a couple of feet of excess wiring, it needed an adjustable bias and some oscillator capacitors to get the vibrato working at its best. The sweet spot seemed like about 23 ma per side, and it works better if you control it with a foot switch.

About Me

I'm a semi retired attorney and amp mechanic in central Iowa. I'm laying off the law and anything else I do not like due to my recent encounter with the Grim Reaper. Well. We passed by each other in the night and I got away clean. I moderate the posts here and I delete without comment those that attack me personally and are generally sophomoric, unlettered and play games with the truth.
This blog isn't a public toilet and you don't get to write on the walls here, people.
OUR CO-EDITOR: Darla Mondou comes to us through a fortuitous convergence of interest in ag law issues and technology-provided by those wonderful folks at Google and Blogger, who provide the forum. Darla is a graduate of the University of Arkansas School of Law and Graduate program in Agricultural Law, she hails from all over like me, and she is currently working on court appointed appeals in the federal system. It pays the bills.